Fundraiser: Peace Direct

Last night, I took myself off to "Singing in the Dark Times" - a fundraiser for Peace Direct (which I'd never heard of). But what the hey, I like to give things a shot, and this was in Bush Hall. Which I'd never been in, but it's just off Shepherds Bush, so not too far to travel, which is a plus.

Google Maps gave me a number of options involving buses, but the quickest - and cheapest - was just to take the Overground to Shepherds Bush and walk up Uxbridge Road for about 15 minutes. So that's what I did. During the week, I wouldn't be keen on taking the Overground between 6 and 7, but that's because of rush hour - it's fine at the weekend. So I did, and arrived at the venue at 6.45, for a 7pm start.

..to find myself at the end of a long queue. Oh, beautiful! Well, at least the weather was ok. So I continued to queue. Unfortunately, I happened to be standing in front of the door to the adjacent bar, and had to keep hopping around to get out of the way of a constant stream of people going in and out. Luckily, after a bit, the queue shuffled up a bit and I was at least past the bar door.

It's an interesting phenomenon, queueing with posh people. I haven't come across it before. Generally they were quite well behaved, although the lady behind me was very snappy with an American woman, who she thought was jumping the queue. No indeed, she had a spare ticket to sell, and was trying to get in to the box office to tell them about it. She asked whether that lady wanted a spare ticket. "Yes!" she said, then swore when she found out it wasn't one that included access to the post-show VIP party. Then wanted to know where it was - she already had a ticket but it was near the back. Then she said she wanted both, when it was patently obvious that the American was only selling one - and sniffily sent her on her way when she discovered she wouldn't sell her both of them.

Now, I don't blame Peace Direct for the organisation of this event, but I'll think twice before I return to Bush Hall. This was an event as organised by the Mad Hatter! Why, in the name of Dickens, didn't they open the doors until five minutes before the scheduled start time? So we were all left queueing outside, and ruminating (correctly) that this would never start on time. And the event sold out, so that was a lot of people. Who, by the way, formed two queues - one from each direction. Which converged on the entrance, so that it took forever to squeeze in the door.

The rather run-down exterior gives no clue of the ornate event room. Apparently, they also hire it out as a wedding venue, and I can see why. The walls and ceiling are white, covered in ornate plasterwork, and dotted with long mirrors. Several chandeliers light the space, and these were augmented with spotlights, and a projector at the back that I only noticed when I was leaving. At the other end is a stage, which had a sheet strung up at the back - obviously, they were planning on showing a film.

Well, the next task centered on finding our seats. It took over half an hour for everyone to manage this. You see, the seats were removable, and had been arranged in rows on either side of a central aisle. Rather close together, I might add - particularly when you have, as I did, a woman in front of you who kept jiggling in her seat, creating more legroom for herself, while gradually moving her chair backwards to decrease the legroom behind her.

Ah, but that wasn't the main problem. You see, the demented organisers had scattered the seats higgledy-piggledy. Mercifully, the seat number was taped on the back of each seat - because there was no other logic to be had. Section 2, where I was, was on the left of the aisle, Section 1 on the right. And then the fun started. You see, the row letters were typed on laminated cards, scattered on the floor along the edges of the aisle. Except.. I was in Row P, but the rows went N..Q..P..R. Well, at least P was mentioned, and I sat down, once I'd ascertained that the seat had the right number on it.

Oh. but that was only the beginning. The row marked as Q was actually O - I guess they didn't have an O so they decided that was close enough. Problem was, there was actually a Row Q - behind me. It merged into Row R - apparently, half of the row behind me was Q, half R. Which led to great confusion, primarily on the part of the misfortunates in Row Q. Perhaps that's why those tickets were cheaper! (They were sold out when I came to buy one.) And then.. some of the row seat numbers started from the aisle, some from the wall. So while P1 was on the aisle, R1 was at the wall (inside Q1, I think). Oh, and then there was the lady who had O2, and pointed this out to the jiggling lady in front of me. But she also had O2. Turned out this second lady had O2 in Section 1, on the other side. Except she'd just been over there and the seat numbers started at 3..

Glory be. Well, by 7.40 everyone was finally, if confusedly, seated. And we come to the next problem. This is just a room, with chairs in it. Yes, there's a stage - but it's not high enough to get a great view. I guess it's adequate - I could see at least the shoulders of each participant - but for the short film they showed, which included several participants talking about peace, I hadn't a hope of reading the captions telling me who they were! That was something they could easily have fixed, by angling the projector up a bit - there was plenty of room on the screen. Bad planning all around! I skipped the section of the applause devoted to the theatre organisation..

Now, as to the event itself, I had no idea what to expect in advance. First thing that happened was a young lady came onstage and started to sing some wordless chant. Then off she went, and we were into the film. As mentioned, this primarily consisted of various people talking about the thinking behind Peace Direct, and what needs to happen on the ground for peace to break out. The most striking moment of the film, for me, was the lady that pointed out that when we think of peace negotiations, we think of high-level diplomats flying all over the world for important meetings. She then pointed out that 50% of these initiatives fail, because the people on the ground - the people living with it day-to-day - aren't involved or consulted. And that's what Peace Direct do - they work with the people who need to be worked with to make peace really happen.

After the film, we had three actors come on. We were supplied with programmes that told us who they were - Mark Rylance, who'd been in the meeting description, Paterson Joseph, who apparently has played in Casualty and Law & Order: UK among others, and was apparently in The Beach, and Meera Syal, who's been in many things, including The Kumars at No. 42 and Broadchurch. Their function was to read the testimony of three "peacebuilders", which is what they call the field workers. Now, this is a good idea as far as it goes, but honestly, it just dragged on.. and on.. we alternated among the three.

Meera Syal told the story of a Sri Lankan woman, who's lived through the trouble between the government and the Tamil Tigers. Paterson Joseph told the story of a man living in the Congo, whose village was destroyed and who was himself tortured, but changed to become a peacebuilder, rescue child soldiers and have them fostered until they can be returned to their famiies. And Mark Rylance told the story of a Bosnian who suffered at the hands of the Serbs during the Yugoslav wars, but whose perspective changed when a peacebuilder told him that what needed to happen was that everybody who'd suffered at the hands of one community needed to be able to tell their story to one member of that community. And that's how forgiveness starts.

I came away with the impression that this organisation does a lot of good, and that their work is really important. I just think they need a better event organiser! The actors gave their time for free, which is great. Meera Syal needed to speak up a bit (they didn't have mics) - maybe she needs more stage practice. Of the three, Paterson Joseph was the most entertaining - he really tried to put some life into it. Mark Rylance, in contrast, was a bit wooden - I believe he plays Thomas Cromwell in the tv version of Wolf Hall. On the basis of this, I won't be seeking it out. It also transpires he's a longtime patron of Peace Direct. Well, that's wonderful - and he was much more impassioned, giving the closing speech. After some more singing, we were treated to Gina McKee and Sophie Okonedo, both of whom seemed to be reciting poems. I think these would have been more effective if we'd heard each in its entirety, rather than jumping back and forth between them. But I think Gina McKee has a lovely, smooth voice, that I could listen to all night.

With the speechifyig, the event did last the advertised 90 minutes. I was rather glad not to be going to the VIP event afterwards, though. I'd been thinking of eating in Nando's on the way back - there's one between the venue and the station - but it was so cold I didn't feel like it, and ran into Sainsbury's instead to buy something to cook at home. Annoyingly, I couldn't use my Nectar points there, as they said it wasn't one of my home stores! A security measure, I guess.

The night ran late, what with me cooking and eating when I eventually got home, and then looking up the BAFTA results. So I didn't get a chance to blog until now. But I did book something for tonight - I'm finally going to The Scottsboro Boys, which seems to have been showing forever! With it nearing its conclusion, finally - the run ends on the 21st - there's been a profusion of offers, so the advice is very definitely NOT to go with the official website. Best deal I found was with LondonTheatreDirect, who have stalls tickets for £25. So I'm off to the Garrick - just down from Leicester Square, but I'm not sure whether I've been there before.